As the celebrations of the 200th anniversary of the Battle of Waterloo have just concluded in Europe and Britain, it is time to reflect on the legacy of the turbulent era that ended in 1815.

The popular memory of European nations preserves the battles
fought during the Napoleonic wars – Trafalgar, Austerlitz,
Borodino, Leipzig, Waterloo to name the key ones – but,
regretfully, not the peace that followed and that was conceived
at the Congress of Vienna, which agreed its decisions several
days prior to the decisive battle.

The grand diplomatic gathering did not only redraw borders of the
traumatized continent. It designed the first collective security
system that guaranteed peace in Europe for decades to come.

At the Congress, the so called Concert of Europe was established
– balance of power maintained by agreement among the leading
nations: Russia, Great Britain, Austria, Prussia and France. Just
like Russia had contributed to the military victory over Napoleon
in the campaigns of 1812 and 1813-1814, the Russian Emperor
Alexander I made a crucial contribution to the Congress by his
vision of a fair and sustainable settlement in Europe, which
brought France as an equal power to the Concert of Europe.

In Vienna, the monarchs and their ministers realized that peace
could only be maintained through continued diplomatic interaction
and coordination of the major powers. They were guided by
magnanimity and foresight, born at the age of Enlightenment. The
next years saw a number of pan-European congresses, and in Vienna
the first-ever permanent intergovernmental organization was
established – the Central Commission for Navigation on the Rhine,
which is still in existence today.

These were the first steps which, 130 years later, led to the
creation of the United Nations.

Significant effort was made in Vienna to create a peace in which
all countries’ interests would be protected. Notably, the Duke of
Wellington vigorously insisted that France should have equal
rights with other major nations. This was a striking contrast
with the flawed Versailles system, which humiliated and excluded
both Germany and Russia. The tragic consequences of such
settlement were foreseen early on by John Maynard Keynes in his
1919 book entitled ‘The Economic Consequences of the Peace’.

The system created in Vienna was far from perfect. It did not
take peoples’ right to self-determination into account, while
rivalry between its founding members led to the senseless Crimean
War and sowed the seeds of the First World War.

The UN Charter laid the foundation for a world system of
collective security. However, nothing was done for a Europe
divided between two opposing alliances. The end of the Cold War
provided an opportunity to fix that flaw, but it was missed and
inevitably led to the present state of European affairs.

It’s not too late yet to learn from history and agree to a
post-Cold War settlement, which would save us a lot of trouble
and lost opportunities in a radically-changed global environment.

The statements, views and opinions expressed in this column are solely those of the author and do not necessarily represent those of RT.